


Never Read the Comments

by trickydeepforest



Category: Glee
Genre: AU, First Meetings, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-04
Updated: 2016-08-04
Packaged: 2018-07-29 07:57:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7676425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trickydeepforest/pseuds/trickydeepforest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While taking photos of a festival for an online magazine, Blaine takes a picture of a gorgeous costume designer.  Little did he know how that one photo would change his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Read the Comments

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lillianmmalter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lillianmmalter/gifts).



> Written for the Todaydreambelievers Fic Gift Exchange 2016 for the prompt: An AU meet cute where Kurt works in the fashion world (NOT as a designer or model - think merchandising, styling, buying for big department stores, stitcher, etc, or maybe an expanded role at Vogue or similar) and Blaine is a photographer (HONY-style, amateur, student, commercial, you pick) who takes and posts a picture of him (with or without his permission) that goes viral.
> 
> I apologize, I kind of failed at Kurt's job, but this is the only scenario I could get to come together for me.
> 
> Many thanks to [fearlessly](http://archiveofourown.org/users/fearlessly/pseuds/fearlessly) for the beta job, and rearranging my awkward sentences.

Dodge, twist, brace, focus, click, click, click. Blaine had his photo-taking-in-an-insanely-hectic-environment down to a well-practiced dance. He had received special permission to go behind the scenes of the day-long LGBT festival, and he didn’t want to make anyone regret that decision by being a nuisance and getting in people’s way. He wove through the crowds, slipped behind the barriers to the backstage areas, and pointed his camera at anything that caught his eye. 

About four hours in, he realized he really needed to take a break and get something to eat. As he stood in line at one of the many food vendors set up on the periphery of the festival, he looked down at the camera to check on how his battery was holding up and winced. He had taken more than 500 pictures already. Even if one out of ten ended up being decent, that was still 50 usable shots, way more than he needed. While the small LGBT arts and music online magazine he worked for was paying him to cover all aspects of the festival, he should probably slow down a little. Especially for the sake of the coworker who was sitting at a laptop doing the post-processing.

While having a camera with WI-FI capabilities definitely sped up the process of getting the photos onto social media, Blaine missed being the one to choose the best ones and edit them into the photographic gems they had the potential to be. On the bright side, with more than 500 photos, the bulk of them would probably be left to him to edit for the post-event write ups.

After hurriedly eating a cheeseburger (and indulging in a cronut) (or two), Blaine resolved to be a little pickier about his shots. He probably had enough general crowd shots, so unless he saw something especially inspiring, he decided to limit himself to the backstage scene. The magazine had other photographers covering the actual performances, since that required tripods and larger telephoto lenses, not to mention staked out locations at each of the three stages.

Blaine checked his schedule and saw that Stage 3 would soon be starting their performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. He headed towards the backstage, deciding he would limit himself to 20 shots of the actors getting ready. Not only was it overkill to take more, but the limit would make him wait for the best opportunities, rather than snapping a photo of every little thing that caught his eye.

His new resolution lasted about five minutes, and then he saw him. He started taking pictures before his conscious mind really understood what he was looking at. 

Amidst all the chaos of the backstage area, a lot of the actors were gathered around one man, who wasn’t in a costume. He was handing out canes, capes, jewelry and hats while chatting and laughing with the group around him.

He was magical in his beauty. 

Surrounded by actors made to look like fairies, dressed in glorious costumes of colored leather and lace, with accents that shimmered and sparkled, he looked like one of the fae himself, sent to give fashion advice to the pretenders. Blaine thought that they could put him out on stage in his skinny jeans, t shirt and vest and the audience would have no trouble believing him to be one of the woodland sprites. 

Blaine was suddenly desperately jealous of all the actors, wanting to be part of that inner circle, to be on the receiving end of the man’s smile, to be the one to illicit a laugh, and wanting to feel the man run his fingers through his hair, even if it was just to fasten a clip there.

Blaine wasn’t sure how long he had been standing there ogling the man through his camera lens, before he got his act together enough to get the group’s attention. 

“Hey guys! I’m from Out and About magazine. Do you mind if I get a group shot here? Your costumes are really awesome.”

“Thank you,” the man said in a high clear voice. 

“That’s all due to this guy,” one of the female actors said, leaning over to kiss the man’s cheek. As if of a single mind, all of the actors started to pose around the apparent costume designer, forming a rather well designed scene around him, flashing their wings and wands and angling themselves to show off as much of their costumes as possible. The designer at the center started to blush and hide his face, but at the laughing insistence of the actor who had kissed him, took his hands down and raised his chin, posing with a small smile on his face. 

Blaine knew it was easily the best shot he got all night, and not just because of the hotness of the man in the center.

Apparently his co-workers felt the same, because when he got home at the end of the night and used his last dregs of energy to check the magazine’s homepage before falling into his bed, there it was, in bright and achingly attractive detail, as soon as the page loaded. They were using it as the cover photo for the entire festival, with the link for more coverage beneath it. Blaine resolved to check out the full article tomorrow, and fell asleep to dreams of magical, mysterious men who were dancing out of his reach.

The next morning, Blaine woke to his phone crashing to the floor, having vibrated itself off of the nightstand. He groggily picked it up, then did a double take when he saw his notifications. Twelve missed calls, 47 missed texts, and oddly, actual hundreds of new followers on Instagram. “What the hell is going on?”, he muttered. He decided to check his texts first, so he would have some idea before he had to actually talk to anyone. Then he listened to his voicemails.

The photo had gone viral. The photo of the most gorgeous guy Blaine had ever seen had been picked up by major national LGBT sites, and even the front page of the NY Times cultural section.

Blaine fell back into bed, his head swimming, trying to come to terms with this unexpected event. He hoped to God this was a good thing, both for him and the person whose face he had just spread across the internet.

 

“I can't believe we have to go interview this guy. Because of one good picture? We have better things to do with our time. Seriously. I can't believe guys are getting all hot over this twink. Isn't the point of dating other men to be dating other men? You know, stubble and muscles and hair on their chests…”

Blaine had been mostly trying to ignore Sebastian’s mutterings, but he caught the last part and couldn't help interjecting, “Don’t you have, like, three hairs on your chest? Just stop already. Just because he's not your type doesn't mean other people can't appreciate him.” He was trying not to let Sebastian’s bad attitude get to him, already feeling nervous enough. The photo had been published a week ago, and Out and About wanted a follow up article. The guy (Kurt Hummel, Blaine knew now) had been nice enough to grant them an interview. Sebastian had been assigned the interview, and as the catalyst to this whole thing, Blaine was going to take more photos to compliment it. Blaine just hoped…

Well, he hoped a lot of things. That Kurt was not upset with him about his new internet popularity. That he could do Kurt’s beautiful face justice in the photos he took today. That he didn’t say anything stupid to cause Kurt to think he was an idiot or a dork or an obsessed creep. Or an asshole like Sebastian was being right now.

At the moment he mostly hoped Sebastian would shut up at some point in the near future. Or now, as they had entered the coffeehouse where they were meeting Kurt.

“Whatever. You’re just hoping he’s going to thank you for making him famous in the fetish chat rooms by bending over for you.”

“Sebastian, shut up.” Blaine nervously looked over at the table where Kurt was sitting, not sure by the look on his face if he had heard that last exchange or not. Blaine would guess that he hadn’t, as he was smiling at them as they made their way over. Sebastian held out his hand abruptly as soon as they reached him.

“I'm Sebastian Smythe, here to do your interview.” He gave Kurt’s hand a perfunctory shake. “I'm sure you remember Blaine, who started all this nonsense.” 

Kurt seemed a little taken aback by Sebastian's clipped tones, looking at him with narrowed eyes before turning to Blaine with a small smile.

“Of course, “ Kurt said, “though I didn't get his name before, but I do realize he's the one I have to thank for this whirlwind I find myself in now.”

Blaine give Kurt a smile and held up his camera. “So while Sebastian asks you a few questions I'm going to take some pictures if that's alright. Our readers seem eager for more photos of you.”

“And I can certainly see why,” Sebastian said in an artificially sweet voice. Kurt’s face hardened slightly as he turned away from Blaine, obviously picking up on Sebastian's dislike.

“So why don't we get this interview started so we can all move on to our busy days.” Sebastian put the voice recorder on the table and sat in his chair in a slouch, looking like he couldn’t care less if they did the interview or not.

Kurt squared his shoulders and twitched his mouth into a small tight smile, obviously bracing himself to handle whatever Sebastian threw at him. Blaine started clicking away, taking shots of Kurt from different angles.

“So don't you think that dressing gay men up as fairies seems a little obvious?” Blaine’s mouth dropped open in shock at Sebastian’s first question and was about to object when Kurt replied in a dry tone.

“Well, they were costumes. For a play. About fairies. So if by obvious, you mean keeping in line with the overall theme of the play, then I guess. Plus, you know, most of them were women.”

“So you don't think it furthers demeaning stereotypes?”

“It was Shakespeare. I'm pretty sure most people understand the concept of context. Would you have gone hipster and dressed them in flannel and beanies?” Kurt asked with a bit of a sneer. Blaine caught it on camera. He would never publish it, but he was fascinated by every expression of Kurt’s he was witness to, and couldn’t help trying to preserve them.

Sebastian ignored the question and started looking around the café disinterestedly, affected boredom rolling off of him in waves. “So a lot of readers are asking if you have an Instagram, Facebook, or any sort of social media presence whatsoever.” 

“Well, no, not at the moment.” 

“So you were just counting on someone stumbling along and discovering you?”

“No, my work gets out there, but usually on the official theater or show blogs. Most directors wouldn't want me to show off costumes before the show opens, and afterwards, well there are much better photographers than me.”

“So you dress people up for a living. Any other hobbies our readers would be interested in? There were a lot of fun suggestions for physical activities in the comment section. You like to hit the clubs? There’s a few fetish clubs that specialize in guys looking for something like you.”

Blaine looked up from his camera in shock to find Kurt and Sebastian glaring at each other.

“Sebastian! That’s enough! What the hell, man?”

“I think we got enough,” Sebastian said dismissively, shoving his chair back and striding towards the door. 

“I'm so sorry about Sebastian. I don’t really know what his problem was, besides that he's got a chip on his shoulder the size of Manhattan. Still, he’s not usually so unprofessional.”

Kurt looked away from the door and back at Blaine. His face was still a little guarded, but then it softened slightly as he took in Blaine’s contrite expression.

“Don't worry about it. I spend my days surrounded by either actors or people in the fashion world. I've got pretty thick skin when it comes to cattiness.” 

They both took a moment to collect themselves and let go of the bad atmosphere that Sebastian had left behind.

“Is your magazine really going to run that interview? I'm not an expert, but I was looking through a few of your back issues and that didn't really seem up to Out and About’s usual standards.”

“Oh no. Not any of that crap, no. No, I would never let them do that, even if they would have.” Blaine took a deep breath and gathered his courage. “But if you don't mind, I'd like to ask you a few questions, see if we can get a better article out of this meeting. I’d hate to have wasted your time.”

“Well, my time is pretty precious,” Kurt said lightly, as he gestured to the chair across from him.

“Have you received any offers since the photo came out?” Blaine asked curiously, eager to know if he had helped Kurt out.

Kurt raised one eyebrow and gave him a look.

Blaine blushed and stuttered, “I,I meant professionally. Offers to design costumes or whatever.” Then he blushed again at his complete lack of eloquence.

Kurt smiled more broadly at him. “I have. A number of off-off Broadway productions, one off Broadway show, and then a wide variety of smaller events, like custom theme weddings. I find myself in the position to turn things down for the first time.”

“Did you go to school for costume design?”

“No, this wasn’t my original plan. I was hoping to go to school for musical theater, but when that didn’t work out I started to get jobs in the fashion industry, my other passion. I took the job as a costume designer to one small play, and that just kept snowballing into more. I’ve been saving up to start taking classes at FIT, maybe, but I’ve been working so much that I can’t even imagine fitting school into my schedule, and now I’m going to be even busier.”

“How about your social life? Do you have a boyfriend? I think our readers will kill me if I don’t ask this question,” Blaine tried to hide the fact that he really wanted to know the answer as well.

“No, I really haven’t had time. The only people I meet are actors or theater people, and the egos are such turnoffs. Not that I wouldn’t consider ever dating an actor, but so far no one’s been tempting enough to deal with all the extra drama. No pun intended.”

“Well, I saw in the comments that you’ve gotten a few hundred date requests, at least, so if you wanted to find someone, you could probably start there.”

Kurt laughed. “Once I weed out the ones with the obscene propositions, there might even be about ten left.” He shook his head. “Well, they’re expecting what they saw in the photo. You made me look magical, I can’t possibly live up to that in real life.” 

“Oh no, Kurt, wow, no, that’s not true at all.” Their conversation hit an awkward pause as they both blushed with embarrassment at Blaine’s outburst. Once he felt in control again, Blaine cleared his throat and changed the subject. “So, you’re all work and no play?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that, but it’s not very exciting stuff. Trashy reality TV marathons and daydreams inspired by issues of Vogue.”

Momentarily forgetting his professional purpose, Blaine leaned towards Kurt and asked “Oh my God, do you watch Project Runway? Did you see last night’s episode?”

A matching gleam entered Kurt’s eyes, and they were off, gushing and ranting about all the drama and scandal of their favorite shows, which were nearly identical lists.

After they had covered the ground of tv, favorite movies and musicals, and their favorite Vogue covers, Blaine realized they had been there for hours. He mentioned the time to Kurt, whose face turned pale (paler). 

“I’m so sorry, I have to go, I have to be at the theater in a little while for a concept meeting.”

As they stood and gathered their things, Blaine reached out to rest a hand on Kurt’s arm. “I’m glad I got to actually meet you.”

“You too. I’m really not sure what kind of article this is going to be for the magazine, but I hope I can trust you to put me in a good light, in the text as well as the photos.”

“Absolutely, and once again, I’m so sorry about Sebastian. I’m not sure why he had such an issue today, but he shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”

“Well,” Kurt said, looking down at his hands and fiddling with a muffin wrapper he had picked up to throw out. “I’m pretty sure it’s because he likes you.” 

“What? No. Besides, even if that’s true then I don’t see how acting like an ass to you would help his case.”

Kurt still hadn’t looked up, and seemed to be blushing. “I would guess he doesn’t handle jealousy well.”

Blaine opened and closed his mouth a few times, but couldn’t get his flustered brain to form words before Kurt continued, finally looking up and raising an eyebrow with a mildly challenging look. “So is it true? What your coworker said?”

Damnit, Kurt had heard what Sebastian said when they came in. Blaine hurried to deny it. “No, no. He never should have said that. I’m so sorry, I hope you didn’t get the wrong impression. I mean, I like you, but no, I would never ask you –“

“Blaine, stop.” Kurt held up a hand to interrupt Blaine’s stumbling apology. “I get it. I have to go now. It was nice to meet you.” And with that, Kurt walked away, his back rather stiff and his head held high. 

Blaine stared after him, wondering how his apology had somehow ruined what he thought had been a great afternoon, and possibly the beginning of something, even if it was only a friendship.

 

Two days later and Blaine still wasn’t sure what had happened. He had written up the pertinent parts of his interview with Kurt for someone else at the magazine (not Sebastian) to polish up for publication and picked out and edited his favorite photos to go with it. Which is why he had no excuse for having spent the last two hours doing nothing but scrolling through the soon to be published article, reading and re-reading Kurt’s words that he could still hear in his memory, looking at the photos that he could recreate in his mind whenever he closed his eyes.

Maybe Kurt had been looking for something fast and fun, like Sebastian had crudely suggested. It didn’t really fit with the impression Blaine had gotten from him, but it would partly explain the abrupt brushing off. Except that Kurt had seemed embarrassed, there at the end. Could he have thought that Blaine was a one night stand kind of guy and was embarrassed that he hadn’t tried to add Kurt to his list? 

OK, now Blaine was really grasping at straws. He let his head fall into his hands with a depressed sigh. He needed to stop wallowing, and give his final approval for the article. Maybe after it was published and Kurt saw that Blaine had kept his word about what kind of tone the article had, Blaine could politely reach out to Kurt again.

Of course, once the article was published there’d be all kinds of guys reaching out to Kurt, if the reaction to the original photo was any indication. Feeling masochistic, Blaine pulled up the original post on Out and About’s website. He had never read any of the comments himself, though he’d been told the gist of them by his co-workers, and had heard some of the more obscene ones recounted word for word by Sebastian.

There were more than twenty thousand comments on the photo, with the most recent having been posted within the last few hours. Blaine spent a little while scrolling through, bristling at insults to Kurt (or to his own photography skills), and feeling more and more insecure after seeing all the guys expressing interest in the gorgeous costume designer.

Tired of trying to make sense of comments that were just responses to in-depth conversations that had branched way off of the original topic, he hit the button to take him to the oldest comments.

And there, right in front of him, was his answer.

The very first comment was from Bryan, who had done the editing and posting the night of the festival: 

_“I’m pretty sure our photographer has a bit of a crush on the handsome gentleman in the center of this photo, since he took about a hundred pictures of him. Our mystery man doesn’t have a single unflattering angle, I can assure you (since I’ve seen them all).”_

This must have been the coworker that Kurt was referring to, and Blaine had practically tripped over his own tongue to assure Kurt that it wasn’t true. Kurt’s reaction made perfect sense now.

Blaine’s body filled with panic, and he had to stop himself from running out of the office to hunt Kurt down immediately to explain the mix up. Instead, he tried his best to think it through, and finally clicked on the no-longer-final draft of his interview and started editing the final paragraph:

_When my boss first asked me to go and take more photos of Kurt Hummel for this article, I’ll admit that I was very nervous, as I had developed quite the crush on him after seeing him at work at the festival. I’m just really glad I didn’t see my co-worker’s comment on the original photo announcing my crush to the world (and to Kurt) until after the interview, or I probably would have chickened out. And that would have been a big mistake, as Kurt is a true pleasure to spend time with, and I really hope that it’s something that I get to experience again someday soon._

 

Four hours after the article was posted to their website, Blaine’s phone rang.

“So,” Kurt said, “I was hoping maybe that you could come over and help me set up my Instagram account.”

“Well,” Blaine said, his smile almost too big to talk through, “Only if you’ll help me with mine.”

“What could a professional photographer like you need from a beginner like me?”

“It turns out that all the new followers I have weren’t really interested in my photography, they were just hoping to see more photos of you.”

“Hmm, well, maybe I’ll let you take a few but I’d prefer if it were pictures of the both of us - together.”

Blaine let out a laugh, his heart lighter than air. “I think I’d prefer that too.”


End file.
